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A comment on One Way to Fight California's Drought: Desalt the Ocean. Parent comment

Re:One Way to Fight California's Drought: Desalt the Ocean by studentrob on Monday August 03, 2015 @05:47PM (#10000115)
I assume it is more complex than appears on the surface. Which crops and processes deserve access to cheaper water? How much water will that save? How much will the price of goods go up as a result? What customers will stop buying as a result? How will farmers react? Should the government try not to bite the hand that feeds its people?

I haven't read any farm bills or anything about water data but that's what I would do first if I wanted to understand more.

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Re:One Way to Fight California's Drought: Desalt the Ocean by Terr_ on Monday August 03, 2015 @07:27PM (#10000590)
> Which crops and processes deserve access to cheaper water?

If you're the one trying to champion "water as a human right", then I think it's only fair to ask you where you would draw the lines. What demarcates personal use and commercial use? How many gallons can someone use for their outdoor "washing" pool before you step in and say that they're abusing the system?

> How much will the price of goods go up as a result?

I don't know, but we have a distributed algorithm for solving it called "capitalism". Like any algorithm, garbage-in makes for garbage-out, and tuning it is a major pain the ass. One of the important inputs is whatever cost on shared-resources (or externalities) imposed by the government.

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Re:One Way to Fight California's Drought: Desalt the Ocean by studentrob on Tuesday August 04, 2015 @01:44AM (#10001876)
Yeah, I do not disagree. I think water regulation should be an open topic. Share data and hold public forums so more parties can work towards a reasonable system that is fair to both businesses and people.
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